Plastic Pollution Countermeasures in Agriculture, Fishery, and Wastewater Treatment

As plastics are utilised in a broad range of sectors, there are various kinds of plastic pollution sources. A United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) report assessing marine litter and plastic pollution identified major land-based pollution sources to the ocean (UNEP, 2021). While landfills are regarded as one of the major sources, other sources include cities (e.g. clothes, carpets, building materials, and single-use plastic (SUP) food packages), roads and traffic (e.g. tyres, road surfaces, and paint), sewage and wastewater treatment plants, and the agriculture sector (e.g. plastic films, fibre textiles for agricultural use, and artificial fertiliser coated with polymer) (UNEP, 2021). In the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) region, a baseline study by the Norwegian Institute for Water Research (NIVA) in 2024 compiled research articles on plastic pollution sources, which include solid waste, agriculture, fishery, aquaculture, wastewater, urban areas, tourism, tyres, textiles, and so on (Collard, Galtung, and Mosberg, 2024).